Thoughts on books, reading and publishing from the staff and friends of the Tattered Cover Book Store.

Monday, September 16, 2013

"'Someone' is a masterpiece of surprising contrasts." ~Cathy

A fully realized portrait of one woman’s life in all its complexity, by the National Book Award–winning author

An ordinary life—its sharp pains and unexpected joys, its bursts of
clarity and moments of confusion—lived by an ordinary woman: this is the
subject of Someone, Alice McDermott’s extraordinary return, seven years after the publication of After This.
Scattered recollections—of childhood, adolescence, motherhood, old
age—come together in this transformative narrative, stitched into a
vibrant whole by McDermott’s deft, lyrical voice.

Our first
glimpse of Marie is as a child: a girl in glasses waiting on a Brooklyn
stoop for her beloved father to come home from work. A seemingly
innocuous encounter with a young woman named Pegeen sets the bittersweet
tone of this remarkable novel. Pegeen describes herself as an “amadan,”
a fool; indeed, soon after her chat with Marie, Pegeen tumbles down her
own basement stairs. The magic of McDermott’s novel lies in how it
reveals us all as fools for this or that, in one way or another.

Marie’s first heartbreak and her eventual marriage; her brother’s brief
stint as a Catholic priest, subsequent loss of faith, and eventual
breakdown; the Second World War; her parents’ deaths; the births and
lives of Marie’s children; the changing world of her Irish-American
enclave in Brooklyn—McDermott sketches all of it with sympathy and
insight. This is a novel that speaks of life as it is daily lived; a
crowning achievement by one of the finest American writers at work
today.

Cathy says: "Someone is a masterpiece of surprising
contrasts. At once a gripping page turner and a literary work of
art, Someone is a novel about an ordinary, quiet life yet also
about the true meaning of life. Alice McDermott has once again
crafted an intense and beautiful testament to the common man. Or in
this case, woman. Rejoice! Alice McDermott always makes it well
worth the wait."